Ghost in the White City
by GingerRogers15
Summary: After Aragorn's death, Arwen fades until she is naught but a spirit whose grieving soul haunts Minas Tirith until the end of the Age. Slight AU, a more tragic version of Arwen Undómiel's end. Inspired in part by 'Arwen's Vigil' by the amazing Piano Guys.


Down empty corridors and through dark hallways

She runs

Hair streaming

Eyes pouring tears from a pale face-

A face translucent and hollow

Gaunt with loss and horror and a love ripped asunder

Tearing at her- rips her apart

Her sundered soul and her broken heart

And her tears are all she has.

A ghost.

She haunts the White City-

She was once the White Lady but no longer.

No longer.

Now she fades.

Her skin so pale it is transparent

Her dress so tattered it appears to drag the stone corridors

She weeps, she wails, she screams

But none seem to hear her.

Trapped forever in a mortal world her soul

Tries to escape in vain-

No use.

There is no escape from the soul, from the mind.

Castle that was once her home- now her prison-

The library, where they danced-

The garden, where they sang-

The bedroom, where they loved-

The courtyard, the bells that rang-

The books, the parchments, the scrolls-

That bear his script, his seal, his crest

But he is gone.

No longer.

His hands shall no longer hold her face

His eyes shall no longer scan the crowd.

His arms shall no longer embrace-

And she no longer shall smile,

Nor draw breath

For she fades.

Even now, she fades.

Day by day, she decreases

Thinner and thinner and thinner-

But no end.

No end for the ghost of the White City,

For she who was once a beautiful maiden-

Now fated to roam

To wander

To weep-

She haunts the passages

The empty rooms-

His room.

Their room.

But their room no longer

For he is not there-

And never again shall be.

Into the study she wanders one night-

Screams when she sees his shadow

But he is not there-

Only his beautiful handwriting and a shadow

A shadow of her son-

Their son.

Now the king, now the leader,

But he knows her no longer.

She is alone.

Alone she sweeps rolls of parchments off of the desk-

She weeps.

Her tears drip onto the papers

But no stain-

For she is not there

But still she lingers.

Her pale fingers grasp ink bottles and quills-

She smashes them into the wall-

They shatter

The broken pieces ooze with black ink

And she thinks of her heart,

And tears run down her face

But do not fall.

And instead they linger as a shadow-

And again she is reminded of her heart.

She screams

With no voice

And none can hear her grieving-

But still she cries,

In a forgotten language and a dying voice

And wishes he could hear her

And wishes he could save her-

But none can save her now.

So she fades,

A silent scream in the dark

And a disturbing dream in the shadow.

The new king (he is her son) tosses in his sleep

But he cannot hear her

Nor can he see her-

But she sees him,

Oh, she sees him every day

And every night,

And she cannot help but think that he looks

So remarkably similar to his father-

And she screams

And gouges her lover's name into the walls

With red fingernails that cannot drip blood-

For her blood is

No longer

Though her heart pains her still.

And the new king gasps when he wakes

For his father's name is scratched into the stone

And he orders that it be erased-

Have this removed at once!

He cries, half in panic

Half in pain

For the memory is still too raw

And too near.

But she cannot erase it from her mind

For her fingernails are worn to nothing

And the ghost of the scars in the stone remains

And though she can see it all.

None can see her.

In the dark a fire burns in the hearth-

The flames are flickering,

Dancing-

Just like they used to dance

In the garden.

And she shrieks in madness

And casts forgotten love letters into the flame,

And the color burns red like her blood-

But her blood is there no longer.

The ashes dwindle but cannot burn

And the wind blows...

And sweeps them across the stone floor,

And into her hair,

And onto her tear-stained face,

And she is reminded of her soul.

Still she fades,

Turns ashen gray and pale-

Her skin no longer white

But the sickening color of a dead flame

And the hue of the winter sky-

Cold and lonely and distant,

Never to be touched-

And doomed to fade

Forever.

Neither living nor dead

But trapped between worlds-

A dead flower pressed between pages of a book

And lost in the parchments between lines of script

That she cannot read, nor comprehend-

And she is doomed to watch it all happen

And she can do nothing.

And nothing can be done for her.


End file.
